


Stars

by MilkMoustachesAreCool



Category: Nothing Much to Do
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2018-04-13
Packaged: 2018-12-02 18:37:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 16,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11515116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MilkMoustachesAreCool/pseuds/MilkMoustachesAreCool
Summary: ‘You are a star,’ he murmured to himself as he logged in to the computer again, which had gone to sleep while he had been in the bathroom. ‘You are constant and eternal and this is just a tiny world with no real significance. Nothing that happens on this world really matters. You are a star, you have been here long before any of this and you will be here long after it ends.’





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay some pretty dark themes to follow so please be warned!! Serious self-loathing, contemplation of death, lightly brushing some eating disorders, just a lot of darkness in John's brain! So please avoid this if you could be affected by any of that stuff. Not all present in this chapter, but all to come in future chapters.

John sat at the desk in the guest bedroom of his aunt’s house, gazing blankly at his face, displayed on the computer screen by the camera app he had opened. He had opened up the camera specifically to record a message, but as soon as his face appeared he had become distracted. John typically avoided mirrors for this reason – seeing his face reflected always had a strange effect on him. He had such a vivid experience of life, such strong feelings and so many intricately woven thoughts, then he looked in a mirror and saw just another face. A face that could belong to anyone on the street. There was nothing particularly remarkable about his face. His lips didn’t display the words he whispered to himself when he was alone in his bedroom. His eyes didn’t display the ever-shifting emotions he was subjected to. His cheeks didn’t display the marks inflicted on his soul by the words of others. His freckles didn’t organise themselves to tell his story. It was just a face, like any other. But John wasn’t like any other person, and he was always surprised at just how normal his face looked in the mirror – or camera app, as the case may be.

Before John got too carried away with his thoughts, he tried to focus his mind on the task at hand. He knew that it needed to be done, but he wasn’t relishing the idea by any means. Where would he even begin? He knew from their insipid YouTube videos that Peter’s friends had all found out about his actions, and Peter had whipped them all into a frenzy about his location, even though John knew full well that Peter couldn’t care less, he was just putting on the act of the caring big brother. Perfect Pedro, the all-round great guy, would never let his brother disappear without at least feigning concern. The dramatic YouTube video aimed at him was definitely more for the benefit of the ‘viewers’ and the wider audience than himself. And even still, Peter had managed to get the perfect subtle tone of condescension and disapproval in.

‘Mum and Dad are worried about you, they don’t deserve to be treated like this’. He was just short of saying ‘I would never treat them like this. Why can’t you be more like me?’ What did Peter even know about what ‘Mum and Dad’ deserved? He had no idea of John’s motives for everything that had happened. He had no idea of ‘Mum and Dad’s’ role in affairs. If John was honest, he was glad ‘Mum and Dad’ were worried. John had gotten his own back on Peter, on Claudio, on all those stupid idiots that worshipped their precious ‘Pedro’, why shouldn’t perfect old ‘Mum and Dad’ get a dose of revenge as well? After all, they were just as guilty of the whole ‘Pedro worship’ as everyone else.

But once again, John’s mind circled back to Hero. Innocent Hero who had ended up bearing the brunt of everything. John immediately grew panicked again. His mind clouded with fear, a cold sweat broke out across his body and the low-level nausea in his stomach soared up until he found himself running across the landing to the toilet. Crouched down over the toilet seat, he closed his eyes and beat his fist against his head. The nausea was unbearable but he had nothing in his stomach to get rid of. He sat, shaking and sweating over the toilet seat, eyes clenched closed as his head swirled uncontrollably.

John couldn’t believe his own stupidity. It was so typical of him to end up in this situation. He thought he was so clever, so intelligent, so much above everyone around him, until inevitably something would go wrong and he would realise he hadn’t been clever at all. He was just an idiot who deserved everything life had thrown at him. He liked to fool himself into thinking he had been hard done by, but every time he ended up crouched over a toilet seat like this, he realised once again that he was the one ruining his life, and trying to drag everyone down with him. Not that he cared when it was people like sickeningly perfect Peter that he was dragging down, but there was always an innocent. Someone who didn’t deserve it. Hero didn’t deserve it.

If John was honest with himself, it was probably some sort of self-destructive pattern. Pick the one person in the world who could possibly ever see something more in you and end up hurting them worse than anyone else. That way he stayed safe at the centre of his destructive bubble, with no one to expect more of him. Ruin anything with the potential for positivity before it can actually happen, so that it could never disappoint him. And it might even be a semi-decent plan if you didn’t account for the conscience that John kept so carefully locked up in his mind. Normally he kept it under wraps and didn’t let it bother him – logic was much more useful than a conscience. All a conscience really was, after all, was emotion. And to allow emotion to rule your actions was irrational. Logic was always John’s weapon of choice. But the conscience raised its ugly head now and then, and right now it was replaying Hero’s reactions over and over through his brain.

Hero who was now in hospital because of John’s actions. Hero who had never done anything wrong, probably in her whole life. Hero who had only ever been kind and thoughtful to John, to everyone. Hero who was now fighting for her life because John had wanted to teach his brother a petulant lesson about sibling rivalry. Hero who at the very least deserved some semblance of an explanation, whether she was well enough to watch it or not.

With that thought, John steeled his mind and stood up, walking back to the computer in the guest room of his aunt’s house.

‘You are a star,’ he murmured to himself as he logged in to the computer again, which had gone to sleep while he had been in the bathroom. ‘You are constant and eternal and this is just a tiny world with no real significance. Nothing that happens on this world really matters. You are a star, you have been here long before any of this and you will be here long after it ends.’

Taking a deep breath, John hit ‘record’ and looked up at his image in the camera. Slowly but surely, he began to talk. He began to tell his story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooo I've tried to write this a few times but I could never finish it, but I thought I'd give it a go again and I at least have a first chapter. Not sure where I'm going from here, but we shall see! Definitely using this as a form of therapy to channel some of my own issues into, so sorry if it gets self-indulgent at times! 
> 
> PS Donalduke to come, along with some brother bonding and hopefully some emotional healing on John's part.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ‘You are a star,’ he told himself. ‘You are eternal. You will be here long after all of this. This is nothing in the grand scheme of things. You are a star. For all any of them know, you may have been dead for millions of years. They could just be seeing you because they’re so far away that the light is just reaching them now, even though it all burned out millions of years ago. None of this is happening now, it happened millions of years ago, and you will be here in another million years. You are a star.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, warning: self-loathing, anxiety, panic attacks, mentions of death, generally dark themes.

When John eventually decided that it was time for him to face the consequences of his actions in full, he decided on taking an overnight bus back to Messina. He always preferred to travel at night if possible. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was the darkness that made him feel a little bit more invisible. Maybe it was the quiet, the muted feeling the world got. It was like a Tim Burton film, the world was exactly the same, just different. Darker, quieter, emptier. Maybe it was the stars that John found comfort in. It was probably silly, but ever since he was a child the stars had been the one thing that could calm his troubled mind, that could ease his emotions when they became overwhelming. The stars were like a rock to John, and he decided that if he was going to take the journey ‘home’ again, then he would need those rocks in the sky available to him during the journey. They would keep him from changing his mind or from having another panic attack. They would keep him company, hold his hand, assure him that he was doing the right thing.

And then, just as the bus was pulling into the Messina station, the sunlight started peeking through, dimming the light of the stars. As John disembarked from the bus and his one solace in life began to disappear he could feel the panic rising once more. Taking deep breaths, he started trudging his way ‘home’. The closer he got to the house he had spent the last few years in, his steps slowed until he was barely moving forwards anymore. He knew that he couldn’t stop – this was something he had to do, had to face – but the closer he got to the inevitable, the more the dread in his stomach rose up. Silly old John, the victim of irony. He had always prided himself on his prioritisation of logic over emotion, and yet he always ended up here, nearly drowning in emotion because of where his logic had led him. Good job, John.

Swallowing up the last of his resolve, he put all thoughts out of his head and pushed open the gate to his father’s house and walked up the driveway. He had barely put his hand on the doorknob before the door had been yanked open and Dad and Anne were pulling him into a hug. John analysed the situation in a detached sort of way. Here were his parents – or his father, at least, and his father’s wife – whom he hadn’t minded hurting a bit because of how little they seemed to care about him. Here they were, showing clear signs of caring. Had those signs always been there and had John been oblivious to them? Or had this little episode shocked them into remembering to care about him? And did John care that they seemed to care about him now? He genuinely couldn’t tell. His mind seemed to be floating far above everything else, not taking anything in fully.

Before long, John had gone through the motions, returned his things to his bedroom, apologised to his parents, attempted to eat something (the buttered toast seemed to taste more like cardboard than anything else) and now it was time to figure out where Peter was. Might as well get everything over and done with as quickly as possible. Band-Aid style. According to Anne, Pedro had gone out for the day with the whole ‘gang’ – an attempt at putting everything behind them and re-bonding. The perfect opportunity for John to resurface, according to Anne. She even offered to drive him up to them. Taking a deep breath (and a quick change of clothes) John agreed and prepared himself for what would probably be a much more difficult reunion than he had with Dad and Anne.

The whole car ride there John fought the urge to tell Anne to turn around. He opened his mouth at least five times to say the words but each time he closed it again a moment later, no words spoken. If Anne seemed to glance at these patterns through the corner of her eye, she said nothing. John seemed to be stuck in a vicious circle of chickening out of speaking to Peter and the others, but then chickening out of telling Anne that he was chickening out, and ending up just sitting there in silence, mind running around in circles.

As they neared the spot where Peter and his friends had come, John could feel the panic rising to a boil in his mind. He could feel Anne watching him and was determined not to let her see what was going on inside his head. Breathing slowly and deeply, he repeated his mantra to himself.

‘You are a star,’ he told himself. ‘You are eternal. You will be here long after all of this. This is nothing in the grand scheme of things. You are a star. For all any of them know, you may have been dead for millions of years. They could just be seeing you because they’re so far away that the light is just reaching them now, even though it all burned out millions of years ago. None of this is happening now, it happened millions of years ago, and you will be here in another million years. You are a star.’

The words helped a bit, as did the image of a starry sky that John conjured into his brain, focusing all of his energy on the metaphor that got him through life. The panic lowered itself a little and John clung to the stars as Anne slowed the car to a stop.

‘I think they’re up in the hills,’ she said calmly. ‘Are you okay from here?’

John simply nodded.

‘Are you sure? I can go with if you want? Or we can go back home and you can speak to Pedro when he gets home if this is too much for you?’

John simply shook his head, not trusting his voice enough even to say thank you as he got out of the car. He closed the car door behind him and turned to face the hills, trying desperately to keep the calm of the stars in his mind. He felt Anne pause, watching him from the car. He half-turned and waved pointedly at her. Taking the hint she slowly drove away. Once she had disappeared from sight, John turned to face the hill again. Panic nearly bubbling over, he steeled his mind, drew once more on the image of a starry sky and began to climb the hill. He repeated his mantra with each step he took, allowing it to take over his mind so that he couldn’t obsess about whatever was about to happen.

Before long he heard the sound of chatter and laughter coming from somewhere in front of him. An icy fear washed over him as he focused all of his energy on continuing to put one foot in front of the other. No backing out now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been writing these chapters at night right before I go to sleep so I haven't been reading through them at all before I post, I don't even know if they make sense, I'm just going with it for the moment though, it's so therapeutic! So yeah sorry if they don't really make much sense, I'll probably read through them all once it's fully done and fix them up then if they don't make much sense!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John hung to the edge of the group, enjoying watching them all frolic around the hillside, carefree and young. It occurred to him that no one watching on would ever be able to tell all the things that they had been through. They looked like stars, bright and shining and eternal. How could these laughs and smiles ever fade?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A slightly brighter chapter - can you tell I had a good day today? As usual though, I haven't even proof-read this yet, I'm just posting as much as I can because it really helps me deal with my own stuff and if I put off posting I would put off writing and I would end up not dealing with any of it, so just ignore the mistakes and the incoherencies and whatnot if possible.

Seeing Peter wasn’t exactly easy. Sure, he came running over as soon as John appeared and practically tackled him in a hug (despite John’s sudden panic that he was running over to punch him, rather than hug him), but John was acutely aware of Peter’s audience during this exchange. Despite the apparent bear hug, both boys were tensed up. After a few greetings to John, however, the rest of the gang pointedly turned around and gave the brothers some space.

‘Look, I watched your video,’ began Peter, glancing over his shoulder. ‘I mean, I don’t really understand what you were talking about fully, but I understand that there was more going on for you than I realised, and I’m sorry for not copping that earlier. We can talk about it all a bit more later on if you like, if that would help.’

If John was being honest, he really hadn’t expected this kind of response from Peter. He had expected to be dismissed, to be written off as dramatic, to be accused of making excuses for his actions. But Peter had actually heard what he had said and listened to it. He had considered it and volunteered to hear what John had to say, how John was feeling. This one little speech from Peter was enough to embolden John slightly, to ease his anxiety a bit and to find the words for what he had to say.

‘Yeah, sure,’ he said, stumbling over his words a bit. ‘Um so listen, I just, I know that what I did was really shitty and I really am sorry, obviously I shouldn’t have done what I did, but I’m only realising that now, at the time that didn’t seem obvious, and I know that’s not really an excuse or anything but I am really sorry for it now, for what it’s worth.’

Peter simply nodded and replied, ‘yeah I know. It’s fine. Well it’s not, but it will be I think. We can talk it all through later on. Sit down for a while.’

John would have liked to have hummed and hawed a bit before accepting an offer to join the group, but Peter didn’t really give him a chance to. He didn’t phrase the offer as a question, but as a statement, and then proceeded to walk back towards the others without waiting for any confirmation from John. John hesitated for a second or two before Peter half turned and called back to him.

‘I’ll drag you over either way, you may as well come over willingly,’ he said quickly, a half smile playing around his mouth. At that, John decided to bite the bullet and see everyone at once – his original plan, after all – and hurried to catch up with Peter as they walked back towards the others.

No one made a fuss about John, although the non-event they were making of his reappearance did seem somewhat forced. Everyone greeted him cordially as if they had simply been waiting for him to show up. Benedick seemed thrilled to see John, and even Beatrice didn’t seem to have any problem with his presence – those two were without a doubt the most explosive risk factors in the equation. Claudio seemed not to understand quite how to respond to John’s presence, at first acting awkward and fidgety. Before long, however, he settled back into the easy demeanour he always had, not quite paying close attention to John, but not ignoring or avoiding him, or jumping when he spoke.

The only person who didn’t go back to normal after a while was Hero. She seemed unable to stop glancing over at John, except for when he glanced at her, when she avoided eye contact with him at all costs. Her eyes kept flitting back over to him and every time they did, John felt his face start to heat up, not knowing how to react.

In an attempt at a gesture of reconciliation, Hero offered John a cookie, a somewhat forced smile on her face, which John accepted with a humble smile, but Hero quickly looked away again, unable to maintain eye contact for even a few seconds. After a little while, John’s attention was so focused on avoiding Hero’s eyes and not turning bright red when he could feel them on him. Rather than sit in discomfort like that for the rest of the afternoon, he decided to take action. Taking a deep breath and gathering up the last reserves of his courage, he stood up and asked Hero if he could have a word with her.

Hero obliged, somewhat reluctantly, and they walked a little way from the others for some privacy. Hero maintained eye contact with her shoes for the most part, while John said what he needed to.

‘Look, I’m not sure what this is worth, but I need you to know how sorry I am for everything that happened, for everything that I’ve done. I’ve already said that I really honestly never meant for you to get caught in the crossfire, but you still did and I’m just so sorry. I know I can’t take it back, and I get that you might not be able to forgive me maybe ever, and if I have to I will spend the rest of my life apologising to you, because nothing will ever excuse what I’ve done.’

Hero was a little taken aback by John’s candour and sincerity. She began to say something, but John was on a roll now and he interrupted her to finish what he needed to say.

‘Sorry, I just need to get this out,’ he said. ‘See, Pedro may eventually forgive me, and my parents and Claudio and everyone else, because even though I was entirely in the wrong, there was a reason that I did what I did to them. But you – I never had any reason to hurt you or to want you to hurt, and it wasn’t just my awful, cruel plan that hurt you, it was my stupidity as well, because I should have realised that you would get hurt more than anyone in the crossfire, but of course I didn’t. Stupid. So if you never forgive me, that’s okay, but I’ll never stop being sorry for what I did, and I really want you to know that.’

John took a deep breath after he had finished, simultaneously dreading what Hero would say and being impatient to hear it.

‘John,’ she began slowly, after it was clear he had finished. ‘It’s not that I can’t forgive you so much as that I’m confused about how I feel.’ Hero decided to match John’s candour and sincerity with her own. ‘You see, what Claudio did, he did to me – specifically to me. And Pedro too. They specifically hurt me, so I was well within my rights to be angry – furious – with them. And I was. And after being furious, I spoke to them, and we all started to move past the wrongdoing and the fury and I began to be able to forgive them. But with you, I’m not even sure I ever felt furious towards you, because you never tried to do any wrong to me, you tried to do it to Pedro and Claud, and like you said, I just got caught in the crossfire. I can’t be angry with you because you did something mean to your brother, can I? But if I was never angry, then I can’t really forgive, and then I’m left feeling strange and uncomfortable around you without knowing how to get out of that. Does that make sense?’

John nodded and waited for Hero to go on. She looked around her a bit before looking back at John.

‘I want to forgive you, John, I really do,’ she said. ‘But I’m just not quite sure how to do that yet. I’m not angry with you, but I think that might have to be enough for you for now. We can work on it in the future, maybe.’

John nodded, tight-lipped. ‘Thank you,’ he mumbled, swallowing back a lump in his throat. ‘Thanks for being honest and not just brushing it under the rug. And thank you for not being angry with me. And I’m still so sorry, and I always will be. I’m so sorry.’

‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ said Hero through a half-smile, before nodding her head towards the others, indicating that they should return. They both turned back towards their respective seats in the group and just before they parted, Hero touched John’s arm softly. ‘Thank you,’ she said quickly, ‘for everything you said.’ John simply nodded before they both sat down again.

The group stayed another hour or so in the hills, during which time John could still feel Hero’s gaze flickering onto him every now and then. He still avoided eye contact with her, but his cheeks no longer burned and he didn’t feel quite so uncomfortable, not now that everything had been addressed.

After a while the group decided to be real life teenagers for a while and make cardboard sleds to ride down the hill. John hung to the edge of the group, enjoying watching them all frolic around the hillside, carefree and young. It occurred to him that no one watching on would ever be able to tell all the things that they had been through. They looked like stars, bright and shining and eternal. How could these laughs and smiles ever fade? The kind of joy they were feeling, that came from a mixture of adrenaline and having made it through troubled times together, was so pure and bright. It seemed simultaneously brand new and ancient. It was the kind of joy that can last for hours and then fade in a split second. Just to watch it made John feel better, made him feel less ill in his mind. It parted the clouds and reminded him of the wonders life could hold, every now and then after a storm, like a rainbow.

When they eventually decided to leave the windy hillside and find somewhere to play a bit of football, John decided to bow out and head back home. He had a very full day and was exhausted. When he got home he made a cup of tea, took two painkillers for his brewing headache, and fell asleep immediately, leaving his tea to go cold. He clung to the pure, bright memory of his brother and his friends, smiling and laughing and having fun on a hillside and dreamed of them sledding down hills and through stars, and the stars laughed as well, and for the first time John could remember, he woke up the next morning, well-rested and feeling happy, peaceful and at ease. He knew that this feeling wouldn’t last forever – it probably wouldn’t even last a whole hour – but it was there now, and he clung to it, sinking into it, enjoying it while it lasted. John had always had a rough life, and the seas weren’t exactly calm yet, but with a brief refuge from the storms and the memory of this feeling to call upon when he needed, John thought, for the first time he could remember, that he might just make it through the storms in one piece.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Busy with real life stuff at the moment so can't upload regularly all the time but I'm getting there)  
> (Not sure where I'm heading with this one I'm just waiting for it to become clear)  
> (I'm actually quite liking it so far though, so I hope you are too!)

After that day, things went back to normal, and they didn’t. All of the drama of the past few months was left firmly in the past. Even Beatrice made a constant effort to forgive and forget. The determination with which the sour events were left behind, however, changed the dynamic itself. Everyone was tenser, more aware, simultaneously not mentioning the unpleasantness and maintaining vigilance against future unpleasantness. Peter was painstakingly nice to John, but it felt like it was a constant effort rather than an unconscious reaction to his brother.

That wasn’t quite fair to Peter though. He was making an effort, which was all John had ever actually wanted. In fact, considering the effort Peter was making, John really thought he ought to start calling him Pedro. He almost always called him Pedro out loud, but in his head he had always called him Peter. He had metaphorically rolled his eyes at the nickname Pedro, finding it stupid and attention-seeking. Why else would anyone choose a nickname as blatantly ridiculous as Pedro? And everyone who called him Pedro (which yes, was everyone) were under his ridiculous spell and thought he was perfect. Whenever John did think of Peter as Pedro, he usually prefaced it with the word perfect. Perfect Pedro. Pedro was the persona, the façade. Peter was the fake, blind, inconsiderate teenager down the hall from John who no one else seemed to be able to see. Now that things were starting to change, however, John decided he needed to make a conscious effort to stop thinking of the names in that way.

In one of John and Pedro’s post-drama bonding sessions (of which there were many) this whole name dilemma came out into the open.

‘Yeah okay like, the whole Team Love Gods thing,’ Pedro was saying. ‘Definitely an example of what you were saying. Like it genuinely didn’t occur to me that I didn’t have the right to – I don’t know, control their lives? Like it was pure manipulation, nothing else, but it just seemed like fun and games to me.’

‘Well in fairness, no one else saw any problem with it either,’ replied John. ‘Like, it may have been your idea in the first place but no one argued with you or anything. And it was Ursula who actually came up with the idea in the first place.’

‘I don’t know, I definitely think some of them weren’t sure about it all, but I was so sure that they felt like they couldn’t say anything. I definitely think Balthazar wasn’t a hundred percent on board. I mean, he definitely thought the two of them should get together, but he told me that he wanted to help them write songs to explore their feelings so that they would come to the realisation themselves that they liked each other. Which he kind of did in the end anyway. Such a Balthazar move. But I always get the sense he wasn’t on board with the whole tricking them into liking each other thing. That one was all me. Or mostly me.’

‘Pedro, you’re being too hard on yourself,’ said John slowly. In the past, anytime he had addressed his brother as Pedro, he had internally rolled his eyes and smiled to himself in the knowledge of his subtle rebellion of referring to him as Peter in his head. Now every time he used his brother’s nickname, however, he had to consciously curb that inner voice. Which, apparently, led to a somewhat stilted utterance of the name Pedro.

‘Why do you keep doing that?’ asked Pedro abruptly.

‘Doing what?’ asked John, confused and apparently unaware of the change in his behaviour.

‘Any time you say my name recently you say it – I don’t know, weird. Like, slower and awkwardly. Why is that?’

John bit his lip, realising what had been happening.

‘Um, I – I don’t know, I – you just – I – well you know…’ John trailed off, not knowing what to say. He didn’t want to explain it all to Pedro. He was ashamed of how deeply his hatred of his brother had become ingrained in his mind and the more of it he revealed the more shame he felt.

‘Don’t do that mate,’ said Pedro. ‘We both said we’d be honest from here on out didn’t we? Don’t make excuses or anything. Just tell me.’

‘You won’t like it,’ warned John.

‘I’m sure I won’t but I don’t really care about that,’ replied Pedro. ‘I want to hear it.’

‘Okay so obviously you know that I wasn’t exactly your biggest fan for a while there. Well, ever really,’ began John hesitantly.

‘Yes, I am aware of that fact,’ replied Pedro. ‘On account of my pig-headedness, I believe.’

‘Um, yeah, well, I always sort of thought it was a bit silly that you called yourself Pedro. That everyone called you Pedro. It just seemed like, um, it seemed to me like more evidence of the things I hated about you, of the idea of you I had created in my head, the one that I hated.’

‘I mean, I get that Pedro is a bit of a silly nickname,’ said Pedro slowly, ‘but you’ve only started saying it weirdly recently, you used to say it normally.’

‘Yeah well, I used to think it was so stupid that I um, I always called you Peter in my head. Like if I was thinking about you, I would call you Peter not Pedro, and it was like this sort of rebellion in my head, like, it was so petty but I thought that by calling you Peter in my head I was sort of getting my own back at you in a small way.’

‘Okay,’ Pedro was clearly still confused. ‘I still don’t get it though.’

‘Well obviously I thought that you would get annoyed if I called you Peter out loud. Or not annoyed, just that it would draw attention to me, which I never liked doing. So I always called you Pedro out loud. But every time I did, I sort of sub-titled over it with Peter in my head. To give myself that little bit of satisfaction, to keep that sort of rebellious feeling. And that was just the normal thing for me to do. But recently I’ve been trying to stop doing that in my head because of all the, you know, all the bonding and stuff. But it means that I’m trying to break a habit that I had for years so your name has been coming out a bit awkwardly I guess because I’ve been focusing on not calling you Peter in my head.’

‘Did you really hate the name Pedro that much?’ asked Pedro, his brow furrowed.

‘Well it wasn’t so much the name as what the name symbolised to me,’ said John, before cursing himself for letting that slip.

‘What did it symbolise to you?’ Pedro latched onto John’s slip.

‘Oh I don’t know, I just –’

‘No obfuscating John,’ interrupted Pedro.

‘It just seemed a bit false. Like you were putting on a persona. I mean, we’ve talked about this before, I basically always felt like you were putting on a show for the world, and Pedro was like your stage name but I was the only one who realised it was a show, everyone else believed it, and I hated that, I just wanted to scream at everyone that it was all fake and that you weren’t perfect Pedro, you were just Peter, acting superior to everyone around you for no real reason. But I don’t think that anymore. I’m sorry.’

John trailed off, scared to look up. It was mostly stuff he had told Pedro before, but every time he was forced to reiterate anything from that part of his life, he grew ashamed again. He also worried about the impact it was all having on Pedro. Pedro seemed to have been getting harder and harder on himself since everything had happened, and John worried that the things he was saying was making it worse. He tried to avoid repeating any of it as much as possible, but Pedro was getting more and more obsessed with talking everything through and finding out everything that had been going on.

‘Huh,’ said Pedro eventually. ‘Maybe I should start going by Peter.’

‘No that’s not the point,’ exclaimed John. ‘I was wrong, I was being too harsh. The name Pedro had nothing to do with anything other than you thought it was funny when you were a kid and it stuck. You don’t need to change it.’

‘Okay yeah, like I know the name doesn’t actually mean anything,’ agreed Pedro, ‘but if it’s easier for you to just call me Peter, if that’s what you always called me in your head, why not just stick with that? I mean, it is my real name after all and I’m eventually going to have to go back to it. I can’t apply for jobs with the name Pedro, and eventually it’s going to stop being funny and it’ll just become stupid and embarrassing, so why not just call it a day for Pedro now?’

John rubbed his eyes. Pedro’s arguments were logical, but John knew that there were more emotions behind the idea than Pedro was letting on. What John didn’t know was how to argue with Pedro’s logical reasons.

‘I think you should just stay with Pedro,’ he said eventually in a tired voice. ‘Getting used to it is my problem, not yours, and it’s good for me to have to endeavour to get past the way I used to think.’

Pedro nodded. ‘Yeah maybe. I’ll think about it a bit anyway,’ he said, drawing the discussion to a close.

John knew full well that Pedro had basically already decided to ditch his nickname, and immediately regretted opening his mouth at all. So much regret, so little time, he thought to himself with a dry smile. He knew that Pedro would tell him not to entertain thoughts that held any level of self-loathing, but it was very difficult not to. John had done an awful lot of things that any sensible person would loathe. Besides, it seemed that Pedro was falling into his own pattern of self-loathing, so who was he to tell John not to.

‘Maybe I’ll start going by Juan,’ said John suddenly, the thought popping into his head.

Peter let out a guffaw at the surprising comment. ‘Pedro and Juan, the clearly-not-Mexican Donaldson brothers.’

‘I’m not sure I have the swagger to pull it off though,’ mused John thoughtfully.

‘If I got away with Pedro for most of my life, you can definitely give Juan a try,’ laughed Pedro.

‘Not if you ditch Pedro though,’ said John firmly. ‘No way am I going faux-Mexican if you’re not backing me up.’

‘Hmm, we’ll see,’ said Pedro drily, drawing the conversation to a close again.

A moment or two later he commented quietly, ‘You could be Juan Duan-aldson,’ and the two erupted in laughter, all attempts at serious conversation left behind.


	5. Chapter 5

What was even stranger than the forced normalness of John’s ‘social life’, was the actual normalness that began creeping back to his life. Before long the beginning of the next school term was approaching and books had to be bought and classes chosen and stationary restocked. John had been through a lot in the months before, but the return to school seemed to be the one challenge that was simply too daunting for him to handle. He had never liked school too much, in fact he had managed to skip a lot of school in the past, but this year was all about changing his old destructive patterns, so skipping class was no longer a viable option. Which was a pity, considering that as much as he had disliked school before, he had never dreaded it this much before. Every time the thought of going back to school entered his mind he was filled with an inexplicable sense of impending doom. He became nauseous and panicky and wanted to bury his head deep inside the duvet on his bed, curl up and never emerge. Unfortunately, the dates kept ticking by and school was as inevitable an eventuality as ever.

Two days before he was due back at school, John, Pedro (now going exclusively by Peter), Dad and Anne all sat down to a family dinner. Pedro had already moved to Wellington for university but he had returned for a fortnight before the university term began. John suspected that Pedro suspected that John was struggling with the whole going back to school thing, and that that was his real reason for spending a fortnight at home, but Pedro – Peter – insisted that it was because his new flat mate Freddie was driving him crazy. John also suspected that Peter may have been attempting to temporarily flee the ever increasing sexual tension between himself and Balthazar, but he knew that that suggestion definitely wouldn’t be received well so he kept his suspicions to himself.

‘All set for school on Monday?’ asked Anne after the dinner had been dished up.

‘Yep,’ said John shortly.

‘Are you looking forward to it?’ she prompted.

John rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, I can’t wait to be stuck in a classroom with twenty other teenagers for seven hours a day being told what to do and when I’m allowed to move or speak or have my own thoughts,’ he replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

‘Come on, cut that out John,’ said Pedro – Peter.

‘What? I mean come on, does anyone actually look forward to school?’ scoffed John.

‘I did,’ shrugged Peter.

‘Of course you did,’ muttered John, rolling his eyes again.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ demanded Peter.

‘Well I reckon if I were going back to a place where everyone loved me and looked up to me and I hate a thousand and one friends and I was good at everything I tried and I was the favourite of all the authority figures and I understood all the social rules and found it easy to fit in and do what I was supposed to and all I had to worry about was whether or not my best friend would flash me that secret smile I was secretly in love with, then I think maybe I’d look forward to going back to school as well. As for the rest of us common folk, however, I think it’s pretty normal to dread school.’ John took a deep breath and shoved a mouthful of food into his mouth, despite the fact that it tasted like cardboard and all he wanted to do was spit it out.

Pedro looked at him silently for a moment or two, trying to figure out which point to tackle first.

‘Okay, I get that it’s different for you,’ he conceded. ‘Although I have no idea what you mean about my best friend – do you mean when I thought I liked Bea? Because that was a very long time ago. Either way, yeah I had a different experience but you should also really try and make the most of it if you can.’

‘Now Peter, I thought we were avoiding the word should,’ reprimanded their father quietly.

‘Right. Sorry. I just mean, it doesn’t have to be awful, and it helps to make an effort to find a way to enjoy it.’

‘Yes Peter, I understand the point,’ said John slowly and coldly, ‘but you’re not understanding that if all of your energy is being spent on literally not standing up and bolting out of the classroom, or throwing up where you’re sitting, or screaming at someone to shut up, it doesn’t leave a lot of energy to ‘make an effort to enjoy it’ with.’

Everyone looked at John for a moment in silence. He cursed himself. Why was he letting these things slip? He couldn’t control his mouth these days. For the same reason, he supposed, as he had just given Peter for his dread of school – he didn’t have the energy to fight anything other than the impending doom in the pit of his stomach. Now the attention of the room was focused on him, which always made John uncomfortable, and everyone was worrying about him again. John hated nothing more than the feeling of being sympathised for. And it was always sympathy, rather than empathy, because no one in that room would ever be able to understand the way John felt. The closest he had ever come to someone understanding how he felt was Cora, because of her home life, but it still wasn’t the same.

‘If it’s too much John, just bear in mind that we can try and organise a transfer to a different school,’ offered Anne eventually. ‘It would probably take some time to put through, but as soon as things feel too overwhelming, just let us know and we can start the process.’

John nodded and looked back to his dinner, taking another mouthful of cardboard. Of anything anyone had said, Anne’s suggestion of moving school was the most helpful. The knowledge that he wasn’t trapped in this situation, that there was a way out of it, seemed to lift a lot of the weight off John’s mind. The knot in his stomach loosened slightly and he almost began to imagine he could actually taste the food in his mouth.

‘Thanks Anne,’ he said quietly after a few minutes of silence. She simply smiled at him sympathetically. John knew she meant well, so he tried not to hate her for the sympathy.

Later that evening John and Peter were sitting in the living room by themselves.

‘Sorry I wasn’t exactly helpful about the whole school thing earlier,’ said Peter after a while. ‘I should’ve listened more and talked less.’

‘It’s fine,’ shrugged John. ‘You can’t magically know what I’m thinking and stuff.’

‘No but I can ask.’

‘Pedro. Peter. You didn’t do anything wrong,’ said John firmly. ‘Stop finding reasons to feel guilty. You’re turning into as much of a sad sack as me. Now tell me. What’s it like living with Ben?’

Peter laughed. ‘Exactly what you’d expect,’ he said. ‘He is manic. I don’t think we’ve gone more than half an hour since we moved in without hearing his voice. He even talks in his sleep, I swear.’

‘Somehow I’m not surprised,’ chuckled John. ‘And Balthazar?’ he asked, eyebrows raised slightly.

Peter shrugged and looked down. ‘Yeah, fine. He’s quieter than Ben. Well, everyone’s quieter than Ben I guess.’

‘Is it weird living with him though?’ pressed John.

‘Weird? I don’t know, not really. Why would it be?’ Peter’s guard was up.

‘You know, living with friends can make you see them in a whole new light,’ said John innocently.

‘Yeah I guess,’ said Pedro. ‘He’s just – I guess, it’s always been hard to figure out what Balth is thinking, and I thought that by living with him it would become easier, that I’d have him more figured out or something. But it’s actually getting harder. Like, I’m around him practically 24/7 and I still can’t figure out what the hell is going on inside his head.’

‘Huh,’ said John. ‘Have you tried asking him?’

‘Balth doesn’t exactly do the whole talking about feelings thing,’ replied Peter before changing the subject. ‘Anyway, it’s all fine, we all get on okay so it doesn’t really matter. Do you think you’ll take Anne up on the whole changing schools thing?’

John kicked himself internally. He had pushed Peter too hard and ended up turning the conversation back onto himself.

‘I don’t know, maybe,’ he replied. ‘Honestly, I probably will yeah. The thought of Messina is literally the worst thought in the world. It would just be so much easier to start fresh somewhere else. Still daunting, but you know, manageably so.’

‘Well, forgive my use of the s word, but I think you should at least give Messina a try again.’

‘Yeah maybe,’ replied John. ‘We’ll see.’

The boys went to bed not long after that. Just before John fell asleep, however, his phone buzzed. He looked at it through bleary eyes and had to sit up and rub his eyes to make sure he was seeing the screen right.

HERO DUKE: Hey John, I was wondering if maybe we could meet for coffee tomorrow afternoon if you’re free? –Hero

What on earth did Hero want to get coffee with John for? Nonetheless, John didn’t think he would ever get to a point in his life when he felt justified in denying Hero anything she asked of him, so he quickly thumbed back a message.

JOHN: Hi Hero, yes that would be nice. When/where would you like to meet? –John

He only had to wait a few seconds before his phone buzzed again.

HERO DUKE: Great! Does one o’clock at Steph’s suit you? –H

JOHN: Yes, I’ll see you there.

John lay back on his pillow rubbing his eyes. He had no idea what to expect from Hero the next day. Why out of the blue did she want to get coffee?

John’s phone buzzed once more and he looked over at it.

HERO DUKE: Perfect, see you then. –H

John locked his phone and turned over in his bed, thoughts running through his head of what Hero might want and what he might say to her and how she would feel and how he would feel and if they would get on well or if it would be awkward or if she were angry with him or if she was being put up to this by Beatrice or Pedro or her parents or God forbid, his parents. Unfortunately, he would have to wait until one o’clock the next day to find the answers to any of these questions.

With that unsettling thought, John eventually fell into an uneasy sleep.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter has taken me so long to get up, I've been super busy! We're getting somewhere now though! Could be a little while again before the next chapter, fair warning

An uneasy sleep, unfortunately, resulted in a late morning. When John eventually rolled over in his bed and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, he looked over at his phone only to realise that it was half twelve already. Cursing himself, he leapt out of bed and started hunting for clean clothes. John had never been the type to care much about what he wore – he had always liked dark clothes because they drew less attention, but other than that he didn’t really care what exactly it was he covered his body in. Today, however, he seemed to struggle with it a bit more. He just couldn’t figure out what the appropriate thing to wear was. How nice should he dress? Was a hoodie too casual? Was a jacket too formal? The minutes slipping away weren’t exactly helping either, and he knew that it would take him at least ten minutes to walk to Steph’s. Eventually he just threw on a pair of jeans and a grey, checkered shirt. It was presentable but not too fancy, he hoped. Running to the kitchen, he checked the time on his phone – ten to one. No time for breakfast so. He tried to feel disappointed by that but in reality he was relieved not to have to force himself to chew and swallow more cardboard. He ran quickly to the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face before bolting out the door.

By rights, John should have been dreading this meeting. He should have been dragging his feet, knowing that he had to face Hero but attempting to delay it until the last possible moment. He should have slowed to the point that he was barely making any progress on the footpath, mind full of the ice cold dread of what lay ahead.

In a way, having overslept was a blessing to John. It meant that he was racing down the street, worrying only about being late and leaving Hero standing there waiting for him. It robbed him of the time to muse over what she might say, the time to change his mind back and forth a dozen times over whether to actually show up, the time for the panic to rise up and threaten to overwhelm him. What’s more, it allowed him to walk straight up to Hero as soon as he saw her standing tensely outside Steph’s and it granted him the words to greet her.

‘Hi Hero,’ he panted, his head swirling a little from the vigorous walk on an empty stomach. ‘I’m so, so sorry I’m late, I overslept a little by accident, I’m so sorry.’

‘John,’ said Hero in a half laugh, ‘it’s literally 13:02.’ She held up her phone to show him the time. ‘You’re allowed to be two minutes late. I literally only just got here myself.’

‘Oh. Okay, cool,’ responded John awkwardly. ‘Sorry anyway though. I should’ve kept better time.’

‘Do you want to go inside, maybe?’ suggested Hero awkwardly.

‘Yep, sure, yes,’ replied John, equally awkwardly.

He stood back to allow Hero to go ahead of him in an attempt at manners and showing respect, but as he was closer to the door, Hero had also stood back to allow him to go first. Then in true comedic fashion, they both moved to go forward at the same time. This haltering attempt at entering the coffee shop lasted far too long to be comedic in any way and was just painfully awkward. They did eventually make it inside, but their difficulty in entering the establishment did not bode well for the rest of the afternoon.

After making it through the door, John was faced with his next challenge. There were some empty tables available, and a girl looking at him expectantly from behind the counter. Did they get their drinks first and then sit down or choose a table first and then get their drinks? And did John even know what he wanted? Coffee? Tea? Water? Did Hero know what she wanted? John glanced down at her anxiously to see if she would take the lead in the situation. She seemed hesitant as well, glancing between the free tables and the girl at the counter, who was still looking at them, waiting for them to make a move, putting more pressure on both of them.

After an unbearably long moment of hesitation, Hero cleared her throat and spoke.

‘Shall we sit down?’ she asked politely.

John simply nodded and followed behind as she led the way to a table by the window, feeling the girl at the counter’s eyes burning into the back of his head as she watched them walk towards a table. He wondered what they looked like to her. With the clear awkwardness and tension between them, they could be anything from a long-awaited family reunion to a first date. Whatever she thought though, John highly doubted that she would imagine anything close to the truth.

After they had sat down and arranged themselves, John dared to glance back up at the girl at the counter. Still looking at them. Oh dear. He glanced at Hero, who had done the same.

‘So, um, do you know what you want?’ she asked, attempting to hold eye contact but getting awkward and looking away again.

‘I think,’ John paused and glanced up at the counter again. Cappuccino - £3.10, Latte - £3.10, Mocha - £3.80, Extra shot - £0.50, Syrups - £0.50, Tea - £2.00. Eyes scanning as quickly as he could, highly aware of the counter girl’s eyes on him, he panicked and simply said, ‘yeah I think I’ll just get a black coffee.’

‘Okay cool, I think I’m going to get a vanilla latte,’ answered Hero, still looking up at the counter. ‘I might get a cookie as well, do you want anything to eat?’

‘No I’m okay,’ said John automatically, his words punctuated by a small growl from his stomach. Hero’s eyebrows raised a fraction but she said nothing.

A few moments later she returned to the table, drinks in hand. After placing them on the table, getting her cookie, sitting down and arranging herself, there was suddenly nothing left to distract them from talking to each other.

John’s gaze flickered up towards Hero to see if she would initiate this – after all, she had been the one to ask him to come in the first place. Hero was looking at the table, drumming her fingers on her coffee cup. She raised it to her lips and took a small sip before putting it back down on the table and glancing up at John.

‘Um, so, how are you doing?’ she began lamely, an apology in her eyes.

‘Good,’ said John on instinct. ‘How about you?’

Hero nodded. ‘Yeah I’m good too.’

The two looked at each other for a moment. The irony wasn’t lost on either of them. Of all the people in their world, they were the two who were most significantly not okay.

‘I mean, okay considering,’ conceded Hero.

‘Yeah, same,’ smiled John drily.

‘Um, are you?’ asked Hero, brow furrowed in concern. ‘I just – I heard that you were thinking of leaving Messina and I just wanted to check in.’

John cursed Pedro internally. ‘Did Pedro put you up to this?’ he asked.

‘What? No,’ replied Hero quickly. ‘No one put me up to anything. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want to be.’ Hero sounded irritated by the suggestion.

‘Okay sorry,’ said John, burying his head in his hands. ‘I just thought – he seemed to want me to stay at Messina so I thought he might have tried to get someone else to convince me.’

‘No I actually heard from Beatrice, who I guess heard from Pedro or Ben or someone,’ explained Hero. ‘But Beatrice seemed to think it was a good idea, that maybe it was for the best. I’m here because I wanted to talk to you about it.’

John wasn’t exactly thrilled that everyone seemed to be discussing his affairs behind his back, but he was certainly relieved that Hero was there of her own accord.

‘I haven’t actually decided yet, Anne just suggested it last night and I’m thinking about it,’ he shrugged.

‘So you’ll be in school on Monday?’ asked Hero.

Despite the wave of panic and nausea that surged through his body at Hero’s question, John made his best effort at a smile and replied, ‘Should be, yeah.’

‘And…’ Hero paused before continuing. ‘Um, how are you feeling about it? About going back to school?’

John simply stared in reply. How on earth was he supposed to answer that? Yeah Hero I’m looking forward to it, apart from the fact that every time I picture it want to curl up in a ball and die.

‘Because I’m dreading it,’ laughed Hero self-consciously when John didn’t reply. ‘I mean, between all of the … unpleasantness … of last year, and the fact that most of my friends have left school, there’s really not a whole lot to look forward to. I have to keep reminding myself that I actually really enjoy learning so I’m not tempted to just drop out like Meg’s doing. Did you know that? Meg is dropping out. She has a friend who thinks she can get her a job in Topshop. I mean, she loves clothes and fashion so she’ll probably be really good at that, but I can’t imagine not finishing my education. She won’t be able to go to university if she doesn’t finish school. I mean yeah, she could always go back and finish school later on if she decides she wants to go to uni, but still, it’ll be a very different life for her. And as much as I’m dreading going back to school, I think the thought of missing out on that life I had planned on is always going to be worse. That’s what I have to keep telling myself, anyway, to stop myself from giving in to the anxiety.’

Self-conscious at how much blabbering she had been doing, Hero hastily raised her cup to her lips again and took a sip.

Somewhat emboldened by Hero’s frankness, John took a sip of his coffee and replied.

‘Yeah well I guess I have pretty bad, um, anxiety or whatever, about it too,’ he admitted. ‘Although I never did like school, all that forced socialising and people having expectations of you and all that. I used to skip a lot of school because I really didn’t like it and um, I guess I didn’t really see the point of it because I reckoned I was pretty – I mean I was an idiot, clearly, but I thought that I was pretty smart so I thought that school was a bit of a waste of time for me.’

‘You are smart, John,’ shrugged Hero. ‘Not always wise, but definitely smart.’

John shrugged and looked away, uncomfortable with the compliment, such as it was.

‘Maybe, I don’t know. Either way, I’m not used to actually making an effort at school, I’m not even used to sitting in class for six or seven hours a day. So to say that this year seems daunting would be the understatement of the year.’

‘I get that,’ nodded Hero. ‘I mean, I’ve always been a good girl so going to school isn’t exactly new territory for me, but I get what it’s like to navigate your way into being a different person than you were before. It isn’t easy.’

‘Hero,’ began John suddenly, looking up from his coffee cup. ‘Sorry if I’m being blunt, but, why did you ask me to meet you today?’

Hero looked down at her cup again. For a few moments there the conversation had flowed almost naturally, but now Hero was back to being awkward and unsure of herself.

‘Um, well, last time we spoke I told you that I hadn’t forgiven you for everything,’ Hero began, still not looking up.

‘Yeah I remember,’ said John, a humourless smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

‘Well I just wanted to make sure that – well, that that wasn’t the reason you were thinking of leaving Messina,’ she finished hurriedly.

John briefly considered lying and saying the typical, ‘no of course not’ that would be expected of polite conversation. This conversation had been defined by candour, however, and John felt there was no reason to change that now.

‘I’m not going to lie Hero,’ he replied with a sigh. ‘It’s definitely a part of what’s going on, but hardly a significant one. Knowing that you haven’t forgiven me makes it a lot harder for me to forgive myself, which obviously isn’t great, and I also really don’t want to make life harder for you in the future. I mean, I’ve clearly had enough of a negative impact on your life already, to make next year even a fraction harder for you is something I’d really like to avoid. But don’t get me wrong, I don’t blame you for not forgiving me – you obviously have every right to hate me for eternity. And amazingly, you don’t seem to full on hate me, but even if you did, that would be completely fair.’ John took a deep breath and locked his eyes on his coffee, taking another gulp from the cup.

‘John, I don’t hate you,’ began Hero slowly. ‘I told you that already. I feel a bit weird around you, and I don’t know how to change that, but I don’t hate you. I never did. I hated Claudio, I hated Pedro, I hated Robbie, I even hated Meg for a while. I definitely hated myself for a while. But I never hated you. And I think that you should remember that. If it helps in anyway. I never fully felt I had a reason to hate you. You were a victim like me, moreso than anything else, in my eyes, I guess. If that makes sense.’

‘But you still feel weird around me,’ said John, eyebrow raised at his coffee.

‘A bit, yeah,’ acknowledged Hero. ‘But there’s something else you should bear in mind – when I think about going back to school, knowing that you might be sitting in class as well is kind of comforting. You know, knowing that I won’t be the only sadsack who was involved in all the drama last year. Knowing that I’m not the only one people are looking at and talking about and pitying and whatnot. You coming to Messina wouldn’t make school harder for me, I actually think it would make it a bit easier. For what it’s worth. Obviously if you don’t think you can deal with Messina that’s up to you and it’s your decision and all, I just thought that you should know that when it comes to me, well I guess just that you shouldn’t consider me a reason to keep away from Messina.’

Of all the things John had expected to come out of Hero’s mouth, that was probably last on the list. Upon consideration, however, John realised that it made a lot of sense.

When he left the coffee shop that day to go home, his feelings towards Monday morning had changed somewhat. He was still full of anxiety and dread, but he also felt a certain responsibility towards Hero. If his being in school would make it any easier on her, how could he not go? He didn’t think there was anything in the world he wouldn’t do if it would make Hero’s life easier. He even began to look at it the same way as Hero – at least he wouldn’t be the only sadsack that people were talking about. They could be sadsacks together. Well, not together, but close by each other.

Yes, Monday morning still terrified him, but at least he had found some spots of light in the darkness to hold on to. He had managed to find some stars in the midnight of his mind, and clinging to them made Monday morning somewhat less terrifying and Messina somewhat more manageable.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry that this fic is getting so long, I usually try and keep them a lot LOT shorter but this one I haven't been able to shorten it. Plus, I'm kind of primarily writing this for my own benefit and doing the long, slow-moving version of it is much more beneficial for me I guess. I kind of love where it's going though, even if it's a bit weird.....hope you are enjoying it though!

Saturday came, Saturday went. Sunday came, Sunday went. Next thing John knew, it was Monday morning, he hadn’t slept a wink, and his alarm was going off. He knew that, just like Saturday and Sunday, Monday would come and go, but that did thought didn’t succeed in comforting him. Filled with dread, he dragged his limbs out of bed and stepped under the hot water of the shower. His mind was stuck in a circle of thoughts.

I can’t do this. I can’t go into school and see everyone’s faces. I can’t do it. But I can’t tell Anne I won’t do it, she’ll worry. And she’ll try talk me into it. And I don’t want her to think I can’t handle it. Can I just skip? No one would notice if I bunked off class surely. Hero would notice. Hero would notice and she wants me to go to school. I can’t let Hero down. I can never let Hero down. Not now, not ever. Besides this year is about changing patterns. No skipping off class, no letting people down. Especially Hero. I have to go. I have to go to class. But I can’t, I can’t do this. Everyone will look at me oh God what am I getting myself into. Surely there’s some way out.

His thoughts continued swirling and circling like this, a nice metaphorical parallel to the swirling of his stomach. He managed to get half a slice of toast inside him before he gave up. He could get coffee at break. After his first two classes. Two whole classes.

Deep breaths, John, deep breaths, he reminded himself. Happy thoughts. Hero is the important one, she needs you in class, that’s all that matters. She is a star, just like you. The two of you, floating in the sky, way above everything else that’s happening down on the ground. You two were here centuries ago and will be here centuries from now and aren’t even really here at all. Be a star. Be a star for Hero. Be a star with Hero.

And next thing he knew, John was walking through the school gates. Schoolbag on his shoulder, he focused on putting one foot in front of the other as he navigated the corridors of the school to find his classroom. Finding the right room, he took a deep breath and opened the door. His eyes scanned the room quickly, searching hastily for an empty seat he could get to quickly and quietly. He did his best to blur out the faces of everyone else in the classroom as his eyes darted around the classroom, but he still found himself making eye contact quickly with Hero. Neither of them acknowledged the other outwardly but they held eye contact for a split second longer than necessary, silently congratulating each other on their presence. Moving his eyes away from Hero’s, John trained in on a seat in the back corner that was miraculously empty, with a few empty seats around it, but not enough to make it stand out. He hastened to the chair, doing his best to keep his head down. Dropping his schoolbag onto the table, he pulled out a notebook and pen. He kept his head low down so that it was almost hidden by his bag on the table and began doodling in his notebook in an attempt to appear busy. He could see the side of Hero’s head, a curtain of hair covering her face, if he turned his head. Something he decided he was probably better off not doing. God forbid someone should notice him turning to look at Hero, they would think he was insane, but more importantly it might reflect more attention onto Hero, which John knew Hero didn’t want. So John kept his eyes on the patterns he was sketching in the back of his notebook until the teacher arrived and started the class.

John really did his best to be an attentive student during the class. He tried to listen and to take good notes and to learn, but his brain seemed to be full of so many other things that he ended the class with only a few lines of disjointed, meaningless notes jotted down, along with a page and a half of doodles.

Classes came and went, break came and went (along with a cup of strong coffee), and before John knew it he was walking through the kitchen door, Monday over and done with. He was surprised when he reached the end of the day at just how bearable it had been. In fact, Tuesday seemed positively manageable at this point.

Throughout the day John had had at least six of the same classes as Hero. For people who seemed so opposite, they certainly seemed to have a lot of shared interests. Then again, maybe they weren’t so opposite. They both had a touch of darkness in them. Although granted, Hero only had that touch because of John – before that she had been pure light. A sun. John had dragged her into the night sky however, turning her into a star.

(And yes, John knew that suns and stars were scientifically the same thing. He didn’t claim that his metaphors were perfect. But they worked for him.)

In all of the classes they shared however, they seemed to pretty much stick to the same pattern. John sitting in one back corner, Hero a row or two ahead on the other side of the room. Both with empty seats next to them. And in each class, as one or other of them walked into the classroom, they shared their split second of eye contact, congratulating each other on making it to another class.

Tuesday came and went, as did Wednesday. Every day it seemed to get easier to keep going. And every day John and Hero maintained their little patterns. John began to wonder what would happen if he ventured to sit in the empty seat next to Hero one day, however. Certainly the rest of the students would be shocked and confused, but would Hero appreciate the company or loathe the invasion? John couldn’t tell and hummed and hawed over it for the better part of the week.

Friday came, however, and with the promise of a weekend to recover if it went wrong, John ventured to attempt his experiment. About halfway through the day, John entered his next classroom and made eye contact with Hero as usual, then quickly looked away. He watched his feet as he moved to his seat as usual, however this time his feet travelled a different path and took him to the seat next to Hero. Sitting down quickly, he kept his eyes trained on his schoolbag as he removed his books and pens. Having arranged his desk for class, he focused his eyes on the book in front of him before very slowly moving his eyes to the side without budging his head. Through his peripheral vision he saw a very definite smirk on Hero’s mouth as she kept her eyes trained on her own book. Neither of them said a word, but they sunk into quite a comfortable silence. John thought it had been okay, but he couldn’t be sure.

In his next class (his last shared one with Hero) he lost confidence in his bold move and walked to his usual seat at the back of the classroom before Hero entered the room. This time, he wasn’t even confident enough to make eye contact with her when she entered the room. Instead he kept his head down and drew in his notebook as usual, ignoring the doorway and who walked through it.

Before long, however, he saw a shadow cross over his notebook, and next thing he knew someone was sitting beside him. A small smirk on his face, John glanced to the side to confirm that the person next to him had a curtain of blonde hair covering their face. Looking back down, John couldn’t help the small smile that was creeping onto his face. Full of exhilaration, John’s heart raced and adrenaline rushed through his body.

And just like that, a new pattern was born.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is awful but I haven't updated in so long I had to post something! I've sort of lost some of the motivation I had for this story .. still determined to finish it but it's slower, more tedious work now and the result probably won't be as good :( I write best when in a flurry of feeling myself lol oops

The first time John spoke to Hero was the day he noticed Claudio holding hands with some brunette in the corridors. He wasn’t sure why but it filled him with a strange feeling, somewhere between irritation and rage. How could Claudio just smugly latch on to another girl? How could this girl, whoever she was, not see through Claudio? And how dare they flaunt whatever was going on between them in front of the whole school? In front of Hero? It was despicable.

He said as much to Hero, but she didn’t seem to share his views. In fact, it didn’t seem to bother her at all. She really did seem to have forgiven Claudio.

After that, they began to share conversations more frequently. Their conversations always had the same tone to them – frank, honest, but never warm. Their pseudo-friendship was based firmly on the fact that they could say anything to each other because neither of them had any obligation to actually like the other.

To John, whose main problem in the past had been a belief that no one like him, that no one could like him, this strange friendship where ‘like’ wasn’t necessary was strangely freeing. Accepting the fact that Hero may never like him, but still wanted to spend time with him, allowed him to stop fighting against her dislike of him, as he had before. He had used sullenness and animosity as a defence mechanism in the past, but with Hero, he never felt the need to defend himself from her dislike. Maybe it was because it was warranted, maybe it was because she still wanted to spend time with him anyway, maybe it was just the honesty that came with it. John knew without a doubt that he could trust Hero, even if she didn’t like him. It was a strange feeling, a strange friendship, but it seemed to work brilliantly for both of them.

They both, of course, also revelled in the unpredictability of their friendship. No one would have seen it coming, even their closest friends and family. Both of them were trying to break out of an old persona, and this unexpected friendship was working wonders with their abilities to change old patterns.

Before long they started playing an unofficial game. They would ask each other questions and the two unspoken rules of the game were total honesty and total confidentiality. They asked everything from favourite movie characters to deepest fears, guilty pleasures to biggest regrets, and everything in between. The game suited them perfectly as it went along with their theme of unflinching honesty with no obligation to like each other. Nonetheless, the more they played the game the more they began to realise that they were becoming closer to each other than to anyone else in their lives. They knew each other inside out and it was difficult not to begin to respect each other.

On one chilly day, they sat outside eating lunch together as usual. John had an apple, a ham and cheese sandwich and a cup of coffee he had bought at the school shop. He had taken a bite out of the sandwich, but other than that bite he hadn’t touched his food and was focusing on sipping his coffee without burning his tongue.

‘Coldest you’ve ever been?’ shivered Hero as she tried to wrap her cardigan even closer around her body.

‘I grew up in England,’ said John drily, taking another sip of his coffee. ‘It gets colder there during the winter than it does here.’

Hero raised her eyebrows expectantly – John hadn’t actually answered the question, and he knew it. He sighed and looked down.

‘When I was about six or seven I had a massive fight with my mum in the middle of winter and I ran down to the park. I think I thought I would live in the playground now that my mother had let me down. But I was a kid obviously so I didn’t understand that I needed a jumper or hat or scarf or anything, and I climbed to the top of the tower and I sat there and got colder and colder and colder. My mum had followed me obviously, she was sitting on a bench waiting for me to come down, and she only had a light jacket on too, but she couldn’t go back for a warmer coat because she couldn’t leave me, so it sort of became a stand-off of which one of us would get too cold and give up first, or at least in my head it was. Eventually the sun started going down and I was shivering so hard I couldn’t even remember why we had been fighting in the first place and I’ve never felt so miserable in my life. Or at least back then I hadn’t ever felt that miserable. Eventually I came down and she didn’t say anything to me, but I could see how red her hands were from the cold and then we both got sick the next day and I knew it was my fault and I just couldn’t believe how stupid I’d been. I thought I’d been teaching her a lesson for being so mean but I’d just ended up making both of us sick and miserable. There were no winners and losers, just me being stubborn and making both of us pay for it.’

John looked down bitterly. That wasn’t exactly one of his favourite childhood memories. What’s more, as he spoke to Hero it hit a bit too close to home for comfort. Clearly he had trouble adjusting his bad habits. He looked up again and was glad to see that Hero wasn’t staring at him or acting appalled, or even particularly sympathetic. She simply nodded and smiled a tight smile, before going back to shivering.

‘Do you want some of my coffee?’ offered John in response to her shivers.

‘With no milk or sugar? Hardly,’ she laughed humourlessly. ‘Was that your question?’

John looked to the side and thought, trying to come up with a new question.

‘Meanest thought you’ve ever had about someone?’ he asked.

Hero looked down. ‘I mean, I’m not proud of it, but there was definitely a time when I fantasised about physically hurting certain people,’ she said to her shoes. John was left in no doubt of the fact that she was referring to the unpleasantness of the previous year.

‘No that doesn’t count though,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘That was a normal reaction, in order to be mean it has to be outside of extenuating circumstances like that.’

‘Okay well when I was a kid I used to wish that Pedro – Peter – would get lost when we played hide and seek so I could have Bea back to myself,’ she shrugged. ‘I’ve told Bea that before, I think that’s probably the meanest thing I’ve ever thought.’

John simply nodded, accepting her answer, and thanking the stars that they had made a ‘no repeating questions’ rule, because his answer to that question would be a hell of a lot worse than hers. Not that that was a surprise.

‘When’s the last time you ate a full meal?’ asked Hero suddenly, looking at his barely touched lunch.

John stammered. ‘I – I don’t know, I mean – what do you mean? I – I eat when I’m hungry – I –’

‘John, answer the question,’ said Hero.

‘I do eat,’ he said in a matter of fact tone of voice, taking a bite out of his apple to prove his point. ‘I finished my dinner one of the days over the weekend, I ate most of my breakfast yesterday morning, I even had a bag of crisps the other day. I just – I can’t always eat.’

‘Why not?’ asked Hero.

‘Ah-ah,’ scolded John, a smile coming back onto his face. ‘One question at a time. It’s my turn.’ John paused, trying to think up something that would keep the conversation away from his eating habits for a while. ‘Why did you say no when Tony asked you to the dance with him?’

John was mildly ashamed for using two things that he knew would distract Hero – she was a bit cagey when it came to guys these days, and still very cagey when it came to big parties or social gatherings – but she had pushed him with the food thing and he knew that she wouldn’t take it too seriously, so he didn’t let it bother him too much.

‘Because I didn’t want to go with him,’ she said shortly.

‘That’s not an answer and you know it,’ said John, raising his eyebrows expectantly and taking another sip of his coffee.

‘I – I mean, I didn’t want to go the dance, that was obvious, even you knew that, so the fact that he would ask me to the dance meant that he clearly either didn’t know me well enough to be taking me anywhere, or did know me and didn’t care enough about what I wanted to suggest something different, in which case I definitely wouldn’t want to be going anywhere with him anyway. He could’ve asked me to go for coffee, he could’ve asked me to go for a walk, to go see a movie, or he could’ve just talked to me at school more, the fact that he asked me to the dance was just so clearly ridiculous that I wasn’t even tempted.’

‘Benvolio asked you out for coffee and you said no,’ pointed out John.

‘Yeah but I couldn’t date someone with the same name as Bea’s boyfriend, that would just be weird,’ retorted Hero.

‘Lorry asked you to the movies that time,’ he added, ticking names off a list in his head.

‘Yeah but he asked me to see a horror film, I hate horror films, and they’re always just an excuse for guys to put their arms around you and try to ‘protect’ you and it’s such a see-through technique like, why would I go for someone who clearly subscribes to misogynistic ‘tricks’ like that to get girls?’

‘Oh hi Bea, I didn’t realise you still went to school here,’ teased John, which simply earned him a scowl. ‘So are you saying that if Tony had asked you to do something other than go to the dance, you would have said yes?’

‘Ah-ah, one question at a time,’ said Hero, mimicking him. ‘It’s my turn now.’

Just then the bell went and the two reluctantly got up to head back into class.

‘And just for the record, in order for a guy to know that you don’t like dances, you have to let them spend time with you to get to know you and find out that you don’t like dances. You can’t expect them to automatically know. They’re not psychic.’

‘You know that I don’t like dances,’ Hero pointed out.

‘Yes but I’m not trying to get to know you, I already know you. A bit, anyway. My point is, if a guy is making an effort to get to know you, you can’t blame them for not already knowing you. That would be like getting mad at me for not knowing the answer to the question before I ask it.’

‘Well has it occurred to you that I wasn’t that invested in getting to know any of those guys anyway? I’m not some poor helpless little girl who needs a guy to be interested in her in order to be complete. If I’m not interested in a guy, why should I try and force myself into being interested in them just for their sake? That’s just a misogynistic attitude.’

‘But you don’t give them a chance, it would be different if you got a chance to know them then decided you weren’t interested, you just write them all off at the very beginning. It’s not misogynistic to give people the benefit of the doubt, male or female.’

‘Well thanks for the advice but giving people the benefit of the doubt doesn’t always work out,’ said Hero pointedly.

John decided to drop the conversation there. They both usually avoided bringing up anything about last year, apart from the odd blatant question like ‘what if you’re plan had worked the way you wanted?’ or ‘what if I had never done any of it?’ For Hero to even hint at it was unusual territory so John decided to back off.

Nonetheless, he had successfully distracted Hero from his eating patterns until they made it to class, so that was a success.

They spent the rest of the class in silence, only to pick up on their walk to the next class with Hero’s question to John.

‘If you could transport yourself magically between here and one other location whenever you wanted, where would you pick?’


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOW it has been a while. I've been meaning to finish this story for ages but life got in the way. Never fear, I'm back! Once again, sorry it's so long, I never usually write really long fics like this, but I do quite love this one. And as usual, it's hella useful for helping me deal with my own shit.
> 
> TW for eating disorders (just barely brushed on but still) and other themes of self-loathing, as usual. Will try update again soon but full-time jobs aren't so conducive to writing.

"Biggest hindrance to progress in your life?" asked Hero, as she lounged on her bed, legs in the air and pen between her teeth.

"Meaning?" John asked, sitting cross legged on the floor, leaning against Hero's bedframe. He studied the textbook in front of him, trying to split his focus between the confusing material and Hero's complicated sounding question.

"Like, biggest thing in your head that stops you progressing or doing things you want to do or growing up or whatever."

"And I thought chemistry was confusing," he muttered, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He dropped the textbook to the floor and sagged back against the bed. "You realise how big a question that is, right?" he asked.

"I need more tea anyway," smiled Hero. "I'll go make it, you meditate on the question."

"Will do. Not like I have exams to study for or anything."

"Tea?"

"Please."

Hero left the room and John picked his textbook back up, his eyes scanning the page blindly. Biggest hindrance to progress in his life. Did stupidity count? Or being a dick? She'd never accept such a two-dimensional answer, though, so John closed his eyes as he tried to conjure up situations where he felt he was stuck, not making progress. Well, the whole eating thing, he guessed. He wasn't addressing it, didn't seem to improve much, one could he was lacking progress in that area. So, what was it that made him avoid dealing with it? Fear of what he'd find if he went digging through the dark recesses of his mind? No, that wasn't it. He'd spent a long time in those dark recesses, it was something to be wary of, but not irrationally so to the point of avoiding dealing with something like this. Afraid of admitting to people that he needed help? He didn't like feeling vulnerable, but he knew that when he needed to he was able to. It was something he tried to practise when he could. Maybe he didn't feel like he deserved the help of people? Being vulnerable around people was one thing, but asking them to help him when he knew he didn't deserve it was another. He knew that if he asked people for help, they would bend over backwards to help him, and who was he to receive such help? He would just realise more and more that he was unworthy of that help and end up sinking back into his hatred of people who played 'perfect'. John looked back down at his textbook, his stomach a little uneasy after such a revelation. Shaking it from his mind, he desperately tried to cram some more information about chemical reactions into his head.

He was taken by surprise when Hero came back into the room, walking slowly with a mug of tea in each hand and a bowl of chocolate pieces gripped between her arm and waist. She slowly placed the cups down, then reached for the bowl.

"Chocolate salad?" she said, offering John the bowl.

John took a piece of chocolate from the bowl and placed it in his mouth, not really tasting anything. "You do know that putting it in a salad bowl doesn't make it healthy, right?" he said, raising an eyebrow at her.

Hero shrugged. "It's a thing Beatrice used to do," she said, popping a piece of chocolate into her mouth. "So, do you have an answer for the question?"

"It's a pretty big question," said John, eyebrows raised pointedly.

"I'm aware," smiled Hero, plonking herself back down on the bed and reaching for her tea.

"Alright then, biggest hindrance to progress in life. Probably the fact that I'm afraid if people try to help me I'll end up hating them for it. Which means I can't ask for help because if I do, they'll give it, and I'll end up wanting to destroy their lives. Which leaves me in a pretty uh, shall we say indepedent? situation."

Hero was quiet for a moment or two, letting the information sink in. "I can't think of anything helpful to say to that," she replied. "That's a pretty bad hindrance to progress."

John nodded. "Yeah, pretty much." He looked back at his textbook.

Hero looked down at her own notes, taking a sip of tea, then suddenly snapped her head back. "Oh, I know!" she exclaimed.

John looked up warily. "You know what?" he asked.

"How to help you break that habit or thought pattern or whatever."

"Were you listening, Hero?" asked John with a sad sort of smile. "If you try to help me, it'll only end up backfiring on you. And I really don't think you want that again."

Hero shook her head. "No, but think about it. You're afraid that if people help you, you'll hate them for it, so what you need is someone to help you in a way that's already hate-worthy. As if they're not really helping you. So, okay, I'll help you with something, but I'll do it to make my life easier and in a way that's unpleasant or inconvenient for you, that way you can't hate me for being nice to you or caring or whatever, you just have to suck it up and deal with it."

"That... sounds pretty stupid," said John bluntly. "Anyway, it's my turn to ask a question."

"I thought you were trying to study?" asked Hero with a mischievous grin. "Just think about it, okay? Because I'm not going to drop it."

John groaned and rubbed his face with his hands. "Okay, my question is... my question is... okay, my question is this: Do you still feel weird around me?"

Hero's triumphant smirk left her face and she looked down, starting to play with her bracelet. "I guess I deserve that one," she muttered.

"Don't worry," smirked John smugly. "I need to use the bathroom anyway. You think about it while I'm doing that."

Hero rolled her eyes and watched John leave the room.

"What have you gotten yourself into now?" John muttered to himself. "Should've left well alone."

John made sure to take his time in the bathroom, washing his hands three times and drying them until there wasn't a drop of moisture left on them. 

When he finally made his way back into Hero's bedroom, he studied his shoes, not sure if he should bring it up again or let her. She was usually the one who was stricter about the rules of the game, so she probably wouldn't let the question go unanswered, and if she did, it probably meant that it was better off unanswered anyway. 

"I--" began Hero, coughing and swallowing before continuing. "I do still feel a bit weird around you, but it's in a different way. And also-- also in a normal way. It's-- Okay, so I never felt normal around you. You were always a bit of a question mark. A grey area. You were Pedro's brother, and Pedro and Bea were best friends and Bea and I were always super close so it felt like I should complete the square and be best friends with you, but then Pedro and you weren't exactly super close either, so it was like... you were where the links were missing, and I never knew what to make of you. Were we friends? Acquaintances? Strangers? I couldn't really tell. And-- and you were friends with people that I would have tended to avoid. Not because they were bad, just because-- I guess because they seemed like people I would have nothing in common with. But I did have something in common with you - Pedro and Bea. So it was all this big blank spot in my head. And then everything went down, and like I said before, I was never really furious with you, so the weirdness got even weirder, because I still couldn't figure out where you fit in my life. Were we enemies now? That didn't make much sense when we'd never really been friends. You couldn't betray my trust because you'd never really had it. And now... Now you're still a bit of a question mark. Are we friends? Or just people who spend time together? I don't really know. But... But I like it like that. I like that you're a bit of a question mark, that you don't necessarily fit in one little corner of my head. It's always what's defined you and if that changed then... then it would be like you weren't the same person. The common thread between how I've seen you always has been this... weird unsure-ness. Is that a word? But yeah. I like that you don't fit in one place and that we can spend time together without it necessarily making sense. So in short, yes I still feel weird around you, but weird is good, I think."

John took all this information in, storing it in his brain for analysis later on.

"Thanks for telling me," he said, taking a sip of his tea.

"Well, you asked," replied Hero with a little grin. That was like a secret code of theirs - "You asked." Because to anyone else it would sound like someone had asked a question and been answered and was grateful, but between the two of them, it simply meant that no choice has been given. The rules of the game had been followed.

"Are you still on chemistry?" asked Hero.

"Trying to figure out the equations, I suck at this."

"Well will you hurry up and move on to English, Marlowe is kicking my butt."

"You always get top marks in English, what are you talking about?" retorted John, rolling his eyes.

"Poetry I can do. Creative writing I can do. Even the novels I can manage. But Marlowe always kicks my butt."

"Well I don't know how you think I'm going to help with that, but what in particular is it about Marlowe that's kicking your butt?"

"Everything!" groaned Hero, collapsing back onto her bed. "Help me please."

"How exactly?"

"You're English, right? You speak Marlowe. I don't. Translate it for me." Hero handed John her textbook, sticking her lower lip out in a childish pout.

John laughed and took the book. "You know that English people don't all speak like this, right?" he asked.

"Don't spoil the dream, Jonathon, just tell me what they're saying!"


	10. Chapter 10

John sat at he and Hero's usual lunch table, isolated enough to avoid the rest of the student body, but not so isolated as to draw attention to themselves. He had his usual black coffee and his physics notes out in front of him as he tried to solve some of the tougher problems he'd been given for homework. Hero walked up to the table and slung her bag down, then threw something on top of John's notes. John had been so immersed in his work that it took him a second to register what it was Hero had thrown down: a bag of crisps. Cheese and onion. They used to be John's favourite.

"What's this?" he asked as he looked at Hero's slightly smug face.

"Your lunch. Eat it," she said shortly.

"I'm not hungry," he said, matching her tone of voice and not breaking eye contact.

"I don't care. Eat it."

"Hero--"

"I really would prefer that the only person who speaks to me in school NOT end up in hospital from lack of nutrition."

"Hero--"

"And I really would prefer that the only person who can make Marlowe intelligible to me not lose focus due to lack of sustenance later on in English."

"Hero--"

"And I REALLY would prefer not to argue about this."

John remained silent for a moment.

"You know other people would talk to you if you gave them the chance," he pointed out.

"Eat your lunch," she said, pinning him with her gaze.

He looked at the bag of crisps on the table in front of him. He knew what she was doing. It was pretty see through, but he still appreciated that she was trying to help him. Nonetheless, the idea of eating a bag full of cardboard didn't appeal to him. Besides, Hero was being quite hypocritical. She had loads of issues she wasn't dealing with. Why should he have to deal with his if she wasn't dealing with hers?

John slowly picked up the bag of crisps, a slight smile threatening at the corner of his mouth. He looked up at Hero, who was watching him, a self-satisfied smile on her face.

"I'll eat these," he said slowly, "on one condition."

Hero raised her eyebrows in question.

"I'll only eat them if you promise to go to Meg's party on Friday."

Hero's face fell. "How do you even know about that?" she asked sullenly.

"Pedro."

"Well, I'm not going."

"Fine, then I'm not eating these crisps."

"I won't know anyone there except Meg and she'll be busy hosting."

"Okay, it's fine, but I'm not eating the crisps."

Hero narrowed her eyes. "Is this you turning into a dick because you think you're not worthy of help?"

John smiled drily. "No, this is me returning the favour."

Hero scowled. "I hate parties."

"I hate crisps," shrugged John.

"You'll come with me?"

"Of course."

There was a long moment of silence as the cogs worked in Hero's brain. Eventually, in a small voice,

"Fine."

John smiled in satisfaction.

"Eat up," Hero reminded him.

John's gaze fell to the bag of crisps in front of him and his smirk faded. Slowly but surely, he opened up the bags and put one of the crisps into his mouth. It tasted like cardboard, but there was the tiniest shadow of something else. Of real taste. He chewed and swallowed, then ate another. It wasn't so bad, really. Not enjoyable, but not terribly unenjoyable either. And when he looked up at Hero as she watched him place another crisp into his mouth and begin to chew it, he could almost begin to taste the cheese and onion.


End file.
